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Thursday, March 27, 2008

Eulogy for Stacey Ahern

First a note to regular readers: thank you for your prayers and support during my sister's time in critical care and since her death a week ago. It is my hope that I am ready to return to intensive special needs focused blogging on Monday. However, in my sister's eulogy there is a message for the special needs community, as Stacey was a brain injury survivor and a disability activist. Also, from my site statistics I know many of Stacey's friends have found this site and I want to share this eulogy with everyone. Thank you all again.

Eulogy for Stacey Ahern by Kate Ahern, March 26, 2008

At just 29 years old it is hard to believe how many lives Stacey had touched but it is true. No matter who I speak with they seem to tell me of Stacey’s humor, her intelligence, her determination and her generosity. Of course sometimes they call it her attitude and her stubbornness, but they are the same thing. Sometimes Stacey touched lives one at a time and sometimes Stacey touched lives a roomful at a time, but she always made a difference.

Many of you remember that Stacey walked everywhere and that she was unafraid to engage in a conversation with anyone she met on the street, whether it was a small child or an elderly homeless man everyone was an equally worthy conversation partner for Stacey and if anyone one needed anything she would hand it over, no questions asked. Recently Stacey stopped and talked to a woman who was pan handling outside a grocery store. The woman said she needed diapers for her baby. Stacey went into the store and purchased diapers and then was chastised by the woman because the diapers weren’t good enough. Stacey didn’t care much because she knew if nothing else the baby had diapers and she got a good story out of it. That was the kind of person Stacey was, she lived on a very tight budget but wouldn’t think twice before buying diapers or anything else for a stranger.

Many times Stacey didn’t even know the lives she touched. She did a lot of public speaking both as part of her commitment to sobriety and as an activist in the disability rights movement. Friends of Bill W. from New Hampshire to New York, and perhaps beyond, have been inspired by Stacey’s story of recovery and she would want all of you to know that she passed away clean and sober, in fact almost eight years to the day of her sobriety date. One of my favorite stories, a story I make my father retell often, is of how he overheard one man telling another man about a courageous young woman with blond flowing hair speak at an AA meeting one night and how that young woman had touched him. The young woman was, of course, Stacey.

When speaking in the disability rights movement Stacey’s most frequent topic was maximizing potential of people with disabilities. I think it can be safely said that nobody had maximized their own potential like Stacey had following her brain injury. In fact, perhaps the most telling fact about Stacey is that after her brain injury, when the doctors said she would not speak again, her first words were, “thank you”. I’m not sure “thank you” would be my first words if someone else just shaved my legs, but that’s Stacey for you, full of gratitude, even for the little things. Of course her next word was “zipper” and I have no idea how to make that meaningful. Years later Stacey spoke to high school students about disability awareness and to people learning to work with children who have developmental disabilities about potential and independence; giving of herself, even when she was self conscious of her speech disorder which sometimes made her speech sound slurred or as if she had an accent.

During her speeches Stacey would talk of her seemingly endless occupational, physical and speech therapy sessions and the potential power of people in lives of individuals with disabilities to never give up and to insist on independence. Stacey had been told she would never walk, talk or use her hands. She ended up doing all three - her message in her speeches was clear and people heard it. As a special needs teacher I could always tell when someone working in my classroom had been to a session Stacey spoke at from a change in his or her approach the very next day. Stacey had that power - to give of herself through her words and make others want to do the same through their actions.

Even in her passing on Stacey gave of herself and touched people’s lives. I am sure most of you remember Stacey’s devastation at losing her hair during her brain injury in 2000 and her dedication in growing that long blond hair back. After she lost her hair we would all tell her that it was growing back and she would respond, at first by spelling on her communication board and later, once she learned to speak again, by curtly saying, “not fast enough!” In the months before her death Stacey had been talking about cutting her hair and donating it to Locks of Love. Stacey wanted to help a child whose hair was not going to be growing back “fast enough”. During one of the last meetings our family had with the wonderful staff of the critical care team at Lawrence Hospital in Bronxville, Stacey’s beloved boyfriend Gilbert suggested that we make sure that this wish of Stacey’s happened and we did, Stacey’s hair has been donated to Locks of Love.

Stacey was a young woman who experienced a lot of pain and difficulty in her short life, but in spite of that she never stopped caring about others and never stopped touching the lives of everyone around her. Perhaps if each of us here today can take this lesson Stacey gave us, to try to give back or at least to try to give a smile every day we can make the world a less painful place, a place full of the kind of love Stacey shared with us all.

Monday, March 24, 2008

Stacey P. Ahern Obituary

from the Lowell Sun

Stacey P. Ahern of Chelmsford, writer and author; 29 CHELMSFORD Stacey P. Ahern, 29, of Chelmsford, died on Thursday, March 20, 2008. She was a beloved sister, daughter, and Godmother. Stacey was born on February 28, 1979, in Lowell, a daughter of Carol Gendron-Ahern of Chelmsford, and Brendan M. Ahern of Lowell. She received her early education in the Chelmsford School System, and went on to attend Chelmsford High School, and graduated from Nashoba Valley Technical High School in 1997. She attended Middlesex Community College prior to attending Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, NY where she was a senior studying Writing and Literature.

She enjoyed writing and had recently completed her first novel. Stacey was a disability activist* who spoke publicly for maximizing potential for people with disabilities, as well as a member of Beyond Compliance, a disability awareness group at Sarah Lawrence College. She enjoyed helping others, and had recently donated her own hair to the Locks of Love.

In addition to her loving parents, she is survived by her grandparents, Albert Gendron and his wife, Priscilla of Lowell; a brother, Brendan Ahern of Hawaii; a sister, Kate Ahern of Haverhill; a godchild, Anthony Torres; her boyfriend, Gilbert Escamilla of Manhattan, NY; her father's dearest friend, Diann Hamblett of Chelmsford; and many cousins, aunts, uncles, and close friends.

AHERN Stacey P. Ahern, 29, of Chelmsford, died on Thursday, March 20, 2008. Visiting hours will be held on Tuesday evening from 4 to 8 p.m. at the BLAKE FUNERAL HOME, 24 Worthen St., Chelmsford. A Funeral Mass will be offered on Wednesday morning at 9 o'clock at St. Mary's Church, Chelmsford. In lieu of flowers donations may be made in Stacey's name to the Sarah Lawrence College, College Resources, 1 Mead Way, Bronxville, NY 10708. Please include In memory of Stacey Ahern in Check Memo. Arrangements by BLAKE FUNERAL HOME, Chelmsford. www.blakefuneralhome.com

*Stacey was a brain injury survivor

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Passing

My beautiful, smart, funny, insightful and courageous sister passed today at 2:30 in the afternoon surrounded by people who loved her beyond words. Her passing was peaceful and gentle and we are all relieved she has no more pain.









At the moment life support was removed the hospital played the music that means that a baby is born, and then they played it again - twins! None of our family had said it aloud but we had all been hoping that would happen, the circle of life continuing in such an obvious way and it would take two babies to fit the personality of our sister.

Our brother had the idea to buy a card for the family of the new babies and he composed a beautiful letter, which I edited and we all signed explaining that they did not know us but our sister/daughter was removed from life support at the moment of their daughters' birth, we had been hoping to hear the music play and that we wished them a life time of happiness with their daughters.

For those who asked in e-mail: services are as follows: visiting hours 4-8 PM Tuesday, March 25, Blake Funeral Home, Chelmsford, MA and funeral mass, St. Mary's Church, March 26th 9 AM.

Saturday, March 15, 2008

Prayers for Stacey


I am sorry that there will be no new blog entries indefinitely because of a family crisis.

I feel a bit uncomfortable asking, but, if you are the praying sort, could you pray for my sister? She has been in a coma, on a ventilator, since Monday and is now in multiple organ failure. That is her to the left. It would mean a lot to me.

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Assessment Tools - Free and Paid

Assessment Tools (To Order)

AAC Devices which Offer Enviromental Controls

In follow up to the last post and in response to a question from a reader here is a list of well known AAC devices which have built in (as opposed to add on) environmental control in the form of the ability to act as an infrared remote control.
Look in your users or training manual and/or on the knowledge base on the vendor's website to learn how to program your device to act as an IR (or x10) remote for a tv, dvd player, mp3 player, remote controlled toys or even the garage door.

Attention: If I missed a device with built in (not ADD ON), "learning" IR please comment and I will add it.

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

IR Remote Controlled Toys and Games


Most high tech dynamic display AAC devices (Dynavox, PRC, Mercury/Mini-Merc) will allow you to use control anything that uses an infrared remote control. Here are some IR remote controlled toys that are age appropriate for older users:

Monday, March 10, 2008

Nothing Replaces Knowledgeable Teachers

In a variety of ways the past week or so I have been reminded that nothing can replace a teacher who is well-educated, well-prepared and willing to learn and research more to be a better teacher.

First there has been a discussion among some people I correspond with about how to teach reading. Within the conversations there were so many myths floating around that my head was swimming. First there was the idea that all it takes to teach any aspect of reading (or anything else) is a "curriculum". Curriculum in this conversation meant an off the shelf book, series of books or software. Thus teachers were speaking as if they could suddenly teach reading if only they had this or that "curriculum". There was little knowledge behind what some people were saying. Nothing indicated that people understood what research says actually works to teach students to read. Maybe I was privileged to have attended the college I attended to prepare to be a teacher, I know I was privileged to have had the professor I had for reading methodology (thanks Donna), but I don't understand how teachers can be in the classroom everyday and NOT know what scientific research says about how to teach students to read.

Science is actually pretty clear on the issue and has been for many years. The problem is that many teaches did not learn how to read themselves using science based techniques, many teachers never studied science based reading research in college and many teachers think that phonemics, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension are boring to teach. Yet that is exactly what science based reading research says we need to teach - phonemics, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. Not "whole language", not "balanced literacy", not "four blocks", we need to use programs created using science based reading research. There is a great article on Ed Excellence that explains all of this (and why those programs are NOT based on science).

Maybe I did luck on where I went to college and who taught me about reading instruction, but even if I hadn't I would still be responsible for teaching reading, which means I am responsible for knowing how to teach reading. That means I would have to hit the library and be willing to self-educate myself about reading instruction. Perhaps I could sign up for a workshop or a class, but somehow I would need to be self-motivated to learn what I need to know because that is my job. Yet I don't know very many teachers who hit the books when they feel unprepared, though many take workshops and to a lesser degree classes. Instead I hear about teachers who order materials or "curriculum" to replace the learning what they need to know or I hear about teachers who just don't bother doing anything. (Chances are if you read this blog you aren't one of those teachers, based on the fact that you are seeking out information on your own.)

As this reading debacle has been going on with around me I have also meet with or heard from many learners or families of learners who do not have access to appropriate assistive technology or alternative/augmentative communication. Someone I know questioned me today about why a student would get to high school and not have a speech generating device if she needs one. Although the reasons behind that may initially look like funding issues or some other reason, the true reason is someone wasn't the well-educated, well-prepared and knowledgeable teacher they needed to be. Some teacher didn't push and press and prove that the student needed AAC and didn't find a way to make it happen.

I'm not saying that all teachers need to be AT or AAC experts (or step on the toes of people who are experts), I am saying that all teachers need to know what is out there, how to get it funded and who is supposed to be doing the work within their school, district or agency to make it happen.

Maybe some of us didn't take the assistive technology or AAC course in college (if there was one), it doesn't matter, we still have the responsibility to learn about it now. Teachers are the team leaders; we are the one thing that schools can't cut (after all speech, OT and PT can be dropped from IEPS, but not having a teacher) and we need to know what our students need and how to get it for them. There is no reason, in this day and age, when children in developing nations are getting lap tops, for our special needs students not to at the very least have someone fighting for them to have what they need in terms of tech, AAC or anything else, but first we need to know what we are talking about. We need to be knowledgeable.

We teachers in the field of multiple special needs have a unique role. A role that very few other educators have. We have even more power to make a difference in our students lives than many other kinds of teachers. I think that is why many of us choose this field, yet when we don't do everything we can to be as knowledgeable as possible we don't make a difference; we end up babysitting.

P.S. I have a feeling this may be my first truly controversial post in nearly two years of writing this blog. Do try to keep the comments civil and productive.

Two Blogs to Watch (for free stuff)

Thanks to Paul Hamilton at Free Resources from the net I want to point you to two blogs that offer links to more free things online for educators.

Saturday, March 8, 2008

Almost 40 Free, No Registration, No Download Web Applicaitons

One of my favorite blogs,from Go2Web2.0, just put up a super blog entry sharing 39 free, no registration, no download web applications. These include a spell checker that works in any program, many photo editing applications and lots of other useful tools. Check it out.

Assistive Technology Resources and Products

Here are some links to companies and agencies which provide assistive technology products, services or support. (Updated July 3, 2008.)

Smart Talk (for ESL) for Intensive Special Needs

The Smart Talk is a learning device designed for ESL/ELL students. Basically you put a photo card into the Smart Talk and each of the three buttons lights up one at a time to guide you through hearing the word, hearing the definition of the word and hearing the function of the word.

My class received a Smart Talk as part of a Donors Choose grant focusing on vocabulary development. I thought the Smart Talk would be fun and very educational for some of my students who need lots of vocabulary development. I was surprised to learn its application when beyond that. The addition of the function of the word when you press the button is great for one of my students who is working on both putting words into sentences and understand broader definitions of words, like category and function. Something none of the press tells you about the Smart Talk which is also great is that on the reverse of each card is a smaller version of the same picture and the text of what each of the buttons says. My one student who is a second grade level reader loves reading the words on the card as the Smart Talk reads it. At the other end of the spectrum, one of my student even enjoys the Smart Talk for the cause and effect value of just pressing the buttons and hearing the speech.

Along with the Smart Talk we received all three boxes of photo cards, which is fantastic. The come in sturdy boxes, already divided into categories and color coded. My student who loves to tear paper was unable to rip the card he managed to hide away after using the Smart Talk to attempt o destroy later. He did manage to wrinkle it up pretty well.

I would love to see the makers of Smart Talk, or a company like Enabling Devices or Ablenet, adapt the Smart Talk and add switch jacks to each of the buttons and/or an option of scanning the three buttons with a single switch. Of course if you or someone you know has the skills you could do at the very least the addition of the three switch jacks yourself.

However a you could use the Linda Burkhart method of adapting a talking picture frame to make the smart talk more accessible by placing the bottom of the Smart Talk in a binder with a rubber bumper opposite the button you want pressed.

All that being said if you do make (or have some else make) the Smart Talk switch accessible you would still need a buddy to change the cards, perhaps when the Smart Talk user presses a voice output switch asking for the card to be changed. That could be fun.

Boardmaker Symbols Addendum 2008


My new 2008 Boardmaker Symbol addendum arrived yesterday in the mail from Mayer-Johnson. The disc contains 1,300 more symbols for your Boardmaker, Boardmaker Plus, or Boardmaker with SDP software. Many of the new symbols are related to math and science or transition to adulthood/post-high school placement. The cost is $29 dollars (US) and it installed like a breeze on my Windows XP laptop, in spite of having almost no memory available. If you need to buy all of the addendums the new 2000-2008 addendum bundle is $125.00.



Even with all of the addendums and downloading the free monthly symbols there are some symbols I wish I had, that I think are not unique to my classroom. I submitted these suggestions for new or revised symbols to Mayer-Johnson today.

I have submitted symbols before. Sometimes you get an e-mail a few weeks to a few months later with all or some of the symbols you request as an attachment (a few times I never heard back after requesting symbols).

I am guessing that Mayer-Johnson appreciates it if you make sure the symbol doesn't already exist before you request it, which it only takes a second to do in symbol finder. As a side note before you search for generic names versus brand names before you give up looking, i.e. a Hoyer is called a Patient Lift. (Remember you can add new names to symbols, so next time you search it comes up as Hoyer.)

Don't forget that you can share any boards you make on the very active Yahoo Boardmaker Group or the (very inactive) Mayer-Johnson Sharing Page.

Friday, March 7, 2008

High Tech Pudding

Today we made green and gold pudding in celebration of St. Patrick's Day (we like to get the party started early in our room). Here are some of my students making the pudding; differentiated instruction combines with assistive technology meaning everyone participates and learns independence.

For technology we used our Enabling Devices pouring cup with a "jelly bean" switch, some standard electric beaters with our Ablenet powerlink and an Ablenet "big red" switch. The students did 99% of the work them selves, with more able students handling the beaters, opening boxes, etc. and switch users doing the pouring (via the switch pouring cup) and powering the beaters via switch for their friend. The end result was four cups of gold pudding (vanilla), four cups of green pudding (pistachio), a bit of a mess and a good time.





































It was very yummy!

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Top 10 Tips for Partner Assisted Scanning Handout

A link to a fantastic hand out on partner assisted scanning was shared on the QIAT listserv today. The hand out offers ten tips for partner assisted scanning and explains each. I plan to go over this handout at my daily staff meeting tomorrow morning. Below are the ten tips, click here to download the PDF of the hand out.

1. Motivation, Motivation, Motivation!!
2. Offer Choices for Multiple Cycles
3. Offer Choices in a Consistent Order: Support a Visual, Auditory and/or Tactual Map
4. Always Include a Way Out ("give me more choices")
5. Decrease the Amount of Questions & Language
6. Consider How Choices Are Offered: Visual, Auditory, Tactual and/or Sign
7. Accept Multiple Communication Modes
8. Attribute Meaning to All Communication Attempts
9. Use Facilitation Strategies as Needed
10. Consider the Implications of Life As A Multiple Choice Test

I would only add a reminder to allow enough wait time for the student to process and respond.

from Promoting Communication on the Fly for Students with Significant Disabilities,
Including Deaf-Blindness: Top 10 Tips for Partner Assisted Scanning
(Hanser, 2007)


Linda Burkhart also has two excellent handouts on partner assisted scanning, one that is an introduction and one that is from a presentation at ISAAC.

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Wikis to Watch

ITC Fusion is a wiki that focuses on teaching life skills while teaching the state mandated curriculum. It has some nice Boardmaker boards and other resources.

ATEN Region 3 Village is a wiki about creating thematic visuals and accessible literacy activities.

Ohio Alternative Assessment has great information for all of working to do alt assessment or teach to state or local standards.

I am also beginning to work on an intensive special needs wiki, but it will most likely be a summer project. It is located at Intensive SPED Resources if you want to check my progress.

Monday, March 3, 2008

My Voice is My Power: Part Three

I did a favor for a fellow a teacher who works in another school district today. She teaches a PDD class grades 1-4 and has a 4th grader who is ready to move on next year. The student in question doesn't really belong in a PDD room, but that is another story. She didn't start using AAC until this year when I let her teacher borrow a 32 message 6 level device from my personal collection, as the school district had no interest in providing her with a device.

Basically I met with the mom of the student and taught her about AAC, displayed three different dynamic display devices and taught her what to say to get an evaluation and a rental in order for her daughter to have a dynamic display device in the relativity near future. Basically I just told her that her daughter (and all children) are entitled to have assistive technology be considered as part of their IEPs. Nothing earth-shattering there, just the law.

I explained that the district must supply the technology if it is educational necessary, but that she could negotiate for them to just pay for the evaluation and the rental of a device to collect data and then have state insurance pay for the device so that her daughter owned it, which has the bonus of making her look like a hero.

In the end this mom said to me, "I know she has things to say. I know she wants to tell us things. I know there are things like what you are showing me out there for her. I just don't know who to ask."

It brings tears to my eyes. This mom knows her daughter, knows she can communicate. We, all of us who are part of the system, have failed. The system that prepares educators, special educators, speech therapists and occupational therapists has failed. The system that placed this child in a PDD room failed. The system that created a situation that forced a classroom teacher to have to go to an out of district teacher-friend for a "favor" of educating a mom on her daughter's rights definitely failed. Those in the medical fields failed, why haven't they given this mom the information, sent the daughter for AAC eval? The device creators and vendors failed, why aren't they finding ways to connect with these desperate parents outside of school districts? Somehow, we, the stakeholders, the moms and dads, and people with disabilities who have found a way through these hurdles themselves and teachers and speech therapists, and device makers, and OTs and PTs, and AT specialists, all of us, we need to do a better job finding a way to give all students their voices and their power.

Saturday, March 1, 2008

101 Ways to Use a Sequential Message AAC Device to Access the Curriculum


Compiled by Toni Waylor-Bowen, Ph.D. & Jessie Moreau, M.Ed., NBCT; March 2007


ELA/Reading Comprehension
• Recite a repeated line in a story/play/poem/speech
• Read from a story, chapter book, newspaper, magazine
• Name the characters in a story
• Sequence events in a story/chapter
• Give important details in a story/chapter / recall facts
• Ask questions (who, what, where, etc) of others about a story/chapter
• Give “stage directions” to others in a play
• Follow the steps in multi-step directions/task analysis (e.g., recipe, simple machine)
• State the logical order of information in a non-fiction text
• Give timeline information about a person in a biography
• Retell familiar events/stories to include beginning, middle, and end
• Name vocabulary words and define terms

ELA/Listening/Speaking/Viewing
• Answer questions during calendar/schedule time
• Uses oral language for different purposes: to inform, to request, to entertain
• Recite the Pledge of Allegiance
• Tell others about an event that happened (at home/community/another class)
• Ask questions of others about their evening/weekend/special event
• Ask survey questions of others
• Repeat auditory sequences (letters, words, numbers, rhythmic patterns)
• Present an outline of a group report or class project to others
• Identify people to participate in a group project/play a game/determine “Who’s next?”
• Interview a guest or teacher new to the school
• Sing the chorus of a song or music/video
• Recite Nursery Rhymes
• Recite a poem
• Call items for Bingo games related to curricular themes (especially fun with a randomizer)

ELA/Writing
• Sequence items to go into a story
• List adjectives/adverbs to go into a story (especially fun with a randomizer)
• Provide vocabulary to be included in a story
• Give details about different parts of a class story

Mathematics/Numbers and Operations
• Count forward
• Count backward
• Count days of the week/month/year
• Count sets of items
• Count using 1-1 correspondence
• Recite prime numbers with visual models for identification
• Skip count
• Recite addition/subtraction/multiplication facts
• State money amounts (by dollars, quarters, dimes, etc.)
• Identify parts of a whole (fractions)
• Identify numerals in expanded notation (9 thousand, 3 hundred, fifty, five)
• Identify and order percents
• Identify and order decimals
• Identify numbers on a number line

Mathematics/Measurement
• State the order of objects based on a dimension (e.g., big/bigger/biggest, long/longer/longest)
• State time (hour/half-hour/quarter-hour)
• Count the increments while measuring (for length, capacity, time, temperature, etc)
• Counts items used in the formula to determine area, capacity
• Give steps in formula for finding volume, surface area, etc.
• Name measurement-related vocabulary words and define terms

Mathematics/Geometry
• Count the number of shapes/solid figures identified in the class, school, community
• Name the various types of geometric shapes when shown the same
• Count the number of sides, edges, vertices, in plane and solid figures
• State the properties of different shapes/solid figures (i.e., a triangle has three sides; a cube has 12
edges)
• Count points on a grid
• Name geometry-related vocabulary words and define terms
• Choose geometric figures then identify them with visual/tactual manipulatives

Mathematics/Data Analysis and Probability
• Count/name the items that are part of the survey
• Count the number of responses/tally marks for each item on a table/chart/graph
• Skip count number of responses when using different scales
• Estimate number of items in a set
• Predict the probability of a given event (i.e., numbers on dice, colors of M&M’s) for experimental
probability activities (randomizer device works best)

Mathematics/Algebra
• State items in a pattern
• Skip count
• State addition/subtraction/multiplication/division rules
• Tell other strategies for solving problems (mnemonic devices)
• Count using ratios/fractions (i.e., 1/3, 2/3, 1; ¼, ½. ¾, 1)
• State formulas for solving problems
• Announce simple equations for students to solve
• Describe simple story problems for students to solve
Science
• State science-related vocabulary words and define terms (“A mineral is made from non-living
substance found in nature.”; “A rock is made from minerals.”)
• Describe items being used in the science task (i.e., minerals, rocks, animals, habitats)
• Describe common features between items (i.e., both the tiger and polar bear use camouflage, both
the bat and possum are nocturnal)
• List reasons/outcomes (i.e., pollution is caused by littering, pouring items in streams or rivers…)
• List items (i.e., major organ systems, names of the planets, items that can be recycled…)
• Sequence items (i.e., life cycles, planets in order from the sun, steps in the water cycle)
• Explain steps in an experiment
• Describe changes in items before, during, and after an experiment
• State parts of a whole (i.e., parts of a cell)
• State parts of a group (i.e., animals that are vertebrates, types of habitats)
• Call items for Bingo games related to science standards (especially fun with a randomizer)
• Describe physical attributes of items (i.e., shape, color, size, hardness, texture)
• Describe characteristics (i.e., habitats, cloud formations, hurricanes, physical/chemical changes)
Social Studies
• List items (individual freedoms on Bill of Rights, original 13 colonies, )
• Sequence items (steps in the producer/consumer cycle)
• State items in first/then and if/then format (“First England wanted to tax, then America wanted independence”)
• Give a timeline of events (history of music, transportation, important persons, events in a decade)
• List key individuals (presidents, world leaders, Civil Rights personalities, famous Georgians)
• List reasons for an event
• Recite lines in a play/music video/skit about subject/time period
• List items/places in governmental jurisdiction (city, state, country)
• List states in regions of the United States
• List countries on different continents in the world
• List cultures (Indian tribes living in Georgia)
• State/list items related to a culture (common words in different languages)
• State social studies-related vocabulary and define terms
• List/describe geographic regions
• List major products of a state, region, country
• Call items for Bingo games related to Social Studies standards (especially fun with a randomizer)
• Sing a song or chorus from a song of a country being studied
• List cultural achievements in the fields of art, music, literature, theater, movies/TV

The following devices allow for sequential messaging:
LITTLE Step by Step Communicator (AbleNet)
BIG Step-by-Step Communicator (AbleNet)
Step-by-Step Communicator with Levels (AbleNet)
Sequencer (Adaptivation)
Partner One/Stepper (AMDi)
* Big Talk Triple Play (Enabling Devices)
Step Talking Sequencer Switch Plate (Enabling
Devices)
* Randomizer (Adaptivation)
Press Your Luck w/ Built-in Sequencer (Enabling
Devices)
* These devices offer randomizing options.
(Device list adopted from GPAT's list of Assistive Technology D